Week 2 - Working Memory

Question 1

How long does it hold information for ?

Answer 1

Over short period of time (15-30 seconds)

Question 2

How is information actively maintained?

Answer 2

Rehearsal (repeating) and processing meaning (chunking; basic unit of information, association). But as soon as rehearsal stops, information is lost.

Question 3

Capacity of working memory

Answer 3

7 (+/- 2) items of information can be maintained in working memory

Question 4

What experiment is used to evaluate ‘capacity’

Answer 4

Digit span task - participant must remember a list of digits presented

Question 5

Define pronunciation time. What is the limit?

Answer 5

Amount of time it would take to say aloud the items being rehearsed. The limit is the # of words that can be pronounced aloud or sub-vocally, 1.5 seconds.

Question 6

Define word length effect?

Answer 6

longer words are more difficult to maintain in working memory than shorter ones

Question 7

Define rehearsal prevention task

Answer 7

Preventing participant from maintaining information in working memory

Question 8

Define interfere

Answer 8

When new information enters and displaces information that is already present

Question 9

Define serial position curve

Answer 9

Observation that participants remember items well from the beginning and end of list but not in the middle.

Question 10

Define primacy effect and the reason it occurs.

Answer 10

Primacy effect refers to having good recall for the first few items on list. It is believed to due to the items being encoded into long term memory.

Question 11

Define recency effect and the reason it occurs

Answer 11

Recency effect refers to being able to easily recall items at the end of the list. It is thought to be due to by the maintenance of those items in working memory.

Question 12

What are the 4 components of the Baddely ‘s model of working memory?

Answer 12

Central Executive - attentional mechanism of working memory.
Visuospatial sketchpad - visual working memory.
Episodic Buffer - coordinates overlap b/w auditory and visual systems and interfaces (combines) working memory with long term memory
Phonological Loop - auditory working memory

Question 13

Visuospatial sketchpad experiment?

Answer 13

Imagery task - people were asked to imagine an answer of a letter. They were then required to make a judgements about that letter. Brook found that performance was worse when the rest task required participants to use the visuospatial sketchpad.

Brook experiment: found that participants were more accurate and faster when they had to speak the answer (phonological) or tap the answer (1 tap yes, 2 tap no; motor) then when they had to point to the array of options (visuospatial) because it interfered with imager task.

Question 14

Define irrelevant speech effect in phonological loop. Evidence?

Answer 14

The observation that the phonological loop is mildly impaired in the presence of background speech.

Experiment: words that sound similar are more easy to maintain in working memory.

Question 15

What does the episodic buffer provide?

Answer 15

It provides needed meaning or semantic based information to be working memory system

Question 16

What is the central executive responsible for? How is it tested?

Answer 16

Attentional system that supervises and coordinates the actions of the other working memory components.

Experiment: n-back task - in the n-back task, a participant is getting a long string of new information, digits. A cue will indicate to the participant that he or she must report a digit that occurred n digits before (where n will vary depending on the task requirements).

Question 17

Concurrent tasks

Answer 17

Tasks to be done simultaneously

Question 18

Articulatory suppression

Answer 18

Is a kind of interference. A concurrent task that prevents participants from engaging in rehearsal within the phonological loop.

Question 19

Define reading fluency

Answer 19

Ability to read at speeds sufficient to process and understand written material

Question 20

Define verbal fluency. Evidence?

Answer 20

Ability to talk without pausing or stopping.

Experiment: student with higher working memory scores were able to generate more examples in a given category during a particular time period than those with lower working memory scores

Question 21

What is the connection b/w working memory and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder?

Answer 21

Researchers found that the more movement a child is engaged in, the better their working memory performance was. Suggesting that the excess movement actually helps ADHD children concentrate rather than hurting them.

Question 22

What is the connection b/w working memory and Alzheimers disease?

Answer 22

Amnesia results directly from damage to the medial temporal lobe but no deficit in working memory. While Alzheimer’s disease is accompanied by a deficit in working memory, therefore, it can be distinguished during its early phases by examining working memory performance